What’s your favorite Christmas TV episode?

“The Best Chrismukkah Ever” is a perfect snowglobe of an episode: pristine from the outside, with its palm trees, party dresses, and pretty cheekbones, but always with the threat that one jolly shake-up will disrupt the winter wonderland within. Fittingly titled, our introduction to Chrismukkah—a bi-religious tradition created by Seth Cohen (Adam Brody) to honor his “Waspy McWasp’’ mom (Kelly Rowan) and his Jewish dad (the forever well-browed Peter Gallagher), consisting of “eight days of presents followed by one day of many presents”—is not only the series’ best holiday episode but one of its best episodes full stop. It has everything you could want from the teen soap: the endless but endearing quips from Seth (“I’ve got Jesus and Moses on my side, man”), the messy melodrama of Marissa Cooper (shoplifting from a department store, chugging a Sandra Lee-level volume of vodka and befriending the lump of coal that is Oliver all in the same episode), shady business dealings to keep the adults busy (again, you have to give those Gallagher brows something to work with), and the sweet swelling of Ryan Atwood’s Grinchy heart, as he’s given a stocking for the mantle and a place in the annual Cohen family Chrismukkah card. The episode aptly shows that no festivity or family is entirely perfect, no matter how fabulously decked the halls or how indie-twee that Bright Eyes “Blue Christmas” cover is. [Christina Izzo]